News from the Midwest Sectional Meetings, March 16-18, 1998, Des Moines, Iowa
Contact:
Dale Rozeboom, MSU Department of Animal Science, 517-355-8398
Jamie DePolo, Outreach Communication, 517-432-1555, ext. 22.
The Health of Baby Pigs
Baby pigs are usually separated from their moms and taken to a segregated early weaning (SEW) nursery at about 14 days old to minimize disease transmission and better meet their nutrition requirements. Michigan State University assistant professor of animal science Dale Rozeboom studied whether the same benefits can be achieved by improving the biosecurity of the animals when they are kept with the adults. Three separate conditions were studied -- SEW, high biosecurity and low biosecurity. With high security, the on-site conditions were extremely strict, and only certain people could enter the nursery rooms after changing clothes and shoes. In the low biosecurity facilities, people freely moved in and out of this continuous flow nursery.
Rozeboom compared these management strategies with different types of feed stuff, and was particularly interested in a sprayed-dried porcine plasma (SDPP), a by-product of the packing industry that is supposed to enhance growth performance.
"We still didn't conclude anything definitely about how SDPP works in pigs, but further work will be done," Rozeboom said. "The SDPP did work best in low biosecurity conditions where the prevalence of disease is greater. But we can easily conclude that segregation of baby pigs at a different site provides the best protection from disease and encourages the best growth enhancement."
Rozeboom will present his research at the joint Midwest Sectional Meeting of the American Society of Animal Science and American Dairy Science Association in Des Moines, Iowa, from March 16-18.